* Base damage estimates do not consider variations in level at this time (I suspect the minor varations here are due to level differences, and we will find that base D will be same for pets w/ same job and same level OR close enough to be the difference between elvaan & galka STR) **martial arts traits expected putting delay at 280 for tier 7

The Following Questions Remain to be answered (and are high on my priority list): What are pet attack values? What are pet defense values? What innate resistances do jugs have? (yuly: wind; fargann: blunt; water, etc) How do Base Damage, Attack, and defense scale with pet level? How do Monster Gloves affect pet level spawn ratios?

Special thanx to IcemanDK for summary compilation and delay calculatons Special thanx to Bookmarku for Call Beast and HP testing. Special thanx to Kegsay for Extensive testing on SMN avatars damage calculations.

The spoiler'd out text is my original post, left for continuity. No, I haven't completed testing. I'm trying to organize it. I would much appreciate community input for those interested. I'm interested in focusing on the 13 newly added jugs since the level cap increase. I'll list out the items I have thought of that I think will be most useful and any ideas I have so far for testing them. I would appreciate constructive ideas on any additional information the bst community thinks would be meaningful as well as ideas for testing that might make it easier or improve the information.

HP We have some limited numbers on this also, I'll just compile them and perhaps get a bit more accuracy. This is pretty easy to test: 1. Check <pethpp> 2. Use Reward 3. Check <pethpp> 4. Compare. reward/MaxHP = hp1-hp2/100

Attack: I'm not exactly sure what to do here besides choose a few benchmark targets and parse each jug against. As far as targets: Something level 0 to see how high a melee hit can be. Might test incremental levels such as level 20, 40, 60, 80, 90+ mobs. On the high end I would probably choose some of the new ~95ish mobs in WotG zones. any suggestions on what mobs would be useful would be appreciated. Alternately, atma may provide a great opportunity here. If capping a visions zone mob at level 90, then I might just stack different levels of attack+ atma and that will provide a means of comparison.

Defense: Again parse the mobs on different mobs, not so much level as something with a well known, or easily established attack. Maybe comparing damage taken by pet to a main job with a known defense value Can do the atma test above for this as well.

Hit rate: This one should be easier. Just compare the time stamps on the hits. I want to see which pets hit faster slower/than each other.

TP Gain: this will probably be uniform, but we'll see. Again this one is not hard to see if you just spam the pettp macro in between attacks.

Elemental effects: This should be relatively easy to test as well, but putting down some numbers for the magical reduction commonly seen for wind on Yuly, and water on fargann should be helpful. Additionally I want to test Jugs for elemental weakness/resistance on all elements perhaps. i think I would need to go with a naked bst duo to go test all this out. Use a one pet for a baseline and compare damage of the same AoE elemental nukes vs both pets. elemental hunting work maybe?

Please let me know any more ideas. I'll be tinkering w/ parser this weekend I think.

I thought that the healing salve I in abyssea does exactly ½ of the pets hp?

So that should be a no brainer.

I think it does. I've heard it does. I don't really doubt it, but I never verified it. Also, I want more precise numbers.

Wouldn't that be a fairly precise method? I mean say you use Atma of Winged Gloom to drop the pet to 25% and then purge the atma, verify the pet is at 25%, then used Healing Salve I. Assuming it is 50% then the pet would be at 75% and if so you'd know however much HP it cured multiplied by 2 is the total HP without buffs?

If I don't forget I'll see about picking some of the other pets and testing before I go NM hunting on BST again.

Bravo on the effort. However, I question the usefulness of doing this testing at level 90. We're going to be capped at 99 forever (and using the jugs that are released for those levels) so you might want to wait until then?

Okay, I've distilled down what I see as the useful and interesting data from this test. I want to share a few of my other observations as well.

Primarily it was to determine the Base Damage of each pet's attack. However, it also confirms the accuracy for pets matches what is expected (95%), so however they adapted pet acc since the level cap increase, the didn't tamper w/ this.

I've found the Crit hit rate rather interesting. These should be the caps. Player cap on crit rate from DEX comparison alone has been found to be 20%. Most the Pets come closer to 30%. This is probably due to them being WAR types having the Fencer Trait. Fencer 1 has been determined to be 5% increase. This information supports the idea that there are indeed multiple levels of the skill and that our pets have it. It is likely this trait goes up to +10% crit rate at level 90, based on my results.

This does NOT explain the crit rate for Discreet Louise. It did in fact go up to 40% for awhile. I know I was disappointed w/ louise at first like most bst who really liked using funguar familiar. I think this shows that Louise has a very unique aspect to her. Louise has a LOT of tp moves compared to most jugs. However the attack was obviously much lower than the others. This made it rather unattractive compared to the initial reaction to the nice attack on most other new jugs.

Louise has the highest base tp/hit that I've tested so far. Just to let you know, part way into my testing I added a /echo <pettp> macro into my pet attack macro. So my raw parse data started showing how much tp was gained/hit. It wasn't hard to calculate how much tp/hit was being gained, accurate to the .1. (tp/hit will be interesting when comparing to attack speed once I can figure that information). I think Louise might be able to function more like sam. Not as much damage on the melee' but MUCH more useful tp moves. I threw some tp moves into the parse to see how high the damage can go. It looks nice when fighting something weaker, but as I'm sure all the bst have noticed, in abyssea they don't scale well. On higher level mobs it is often about the same damage as a crit hit, often less. Louise may differ here in especially 1 move: Silence Gas. Its a breath attack, the damage will be based on pet hp. I'm not sure if we can modify it w/ hp+ atma but it should be a consistant 1k damage regardless of level. I'll try this out more sometime. spamming 1k tp moves could be a nice little boost to our damage. I'm not exactly sure what to think of a crit hit rate over 35%...

Also to support my above thoughts, Yuly only hit around 20% crit rate. As a thf instead of a war, this points at the lack of fencer. My testing so far will not say anything about double and triple attack rates on pets.

edit: I know random is random.. but something else I noticed during the testing: Yuly ACC was 100% for the first 50 kills. then dropped down for the next 50+. The reason I mention is because we do know ladybug behavior is different between night and day, and the first 1/2 was during daytime, 2nd 1/2 during the night. I'm interested in checking on this.

oh, for those who don't dig into the mechanics too much, the base dmg estimate above is a pretty decent estimate what the damage of the pet's weapon would be if they were holding one.

The wiki discussion page on NurseryNazuna had some HP tests from level 80 cap (~4500 HP) and level 85 cap (~5000 HP). I've never done pet level cap testing/speculation before, but maybe Nazuna is a 76-86 pet (capping at 5114 HP) before BA merits are applied. I don't own Monster Gloves, so with 2 BA merits I spawn 88-90 NNs, hence the three Max HP tiers in the third batch.

Edit2: Put in another merit of Beast Affinity (3/5 now) to double-check the minimum spawn level and some Nazunas are still popping with 5272 max HP (which I speculated was level 88 max HP). So at least that is consistent!

@Bookmarku thank you very much for the very precise numbers! I think you have positively Identified Nazuna's level cap as well. Great job. I didn't really think to search for it in this way. Awesome. but it does look like eve w/ full BA nazuna will cap at level 96. Still usable at level 99, but a bit disappointing. It also means SE intend us to keep BA merits... W/ 20 points and easy limit points, this becomes a viable way of testing pet levels. I'm gonna burn alot of jugs :D

They seem to have changed the pattern here as well. Most pets had 13 levels before, this is only 10.

Also, I've updated my table from above to include Audacious Anna. (I just need Clyvonne and Merle now for this test... Merle is kinda hard to find... no one making it. I'll probably have to skill up woodworking.) I really want to test Merle because he's a mnk and will have different and interesting information.

Edited, Feb 28th 2011 2:30am by Xilk

This also means my tests so far will probably differ w/ the capped pets. If nazuna hits cap, then it makes sense perhaps lulush, Yuly, merle, clyvonne also might cap at this level. :(

Edited, Feb 28th 2011 2:55am by Xilk

I logged out in Baflau today to start testing pet attack vs greater colibri when I get back in. I'll probably spend alot of jugs. (I'm also getting Wise Man's Fear on the way home from Work, so I'll have something else occupying much of my attention while testing. hope I can manage that well....)

Shasra and Broncha should always have the same hp. level 90 jugs at level 90 cap. I was surprised to see julio's attack up there w/ Broncha and Seighard. Edited, Mar 1st 2011 1:56am by Xilk

Hit rate: This one should be easier. Just compare the time stamps on the hits. I want to see which pets hit faster slower/than each other.

You may want to fraps it and count frames, time stamps aren't very accurate.

What would one use as a reference point for when to count?

If I melee next to pet, at least I'll have a reference delay to compare # of hits to. no?

Edited, Mar 3rd 2011 3:27am by Xilk

Edited, Mar 3rd 2011 3:27am by Xilk

lolz. actually instead of fighting g.colibri I just just go to ballista w/ someone. much quicker. known defense/vit attack, etc is no problem then. Pets do tend to kill players very fast though. 3-4 hits.... I wonder how well a pld would stand up to them.

If nazuna hits cap, then it makes sense perhaps lulush, Yuly, merle, clyvonne also might cap at this level. :(

I thought that this might be the case, so I grabbed a few stacks of Wool Grease to check on DipperYuly. I went into the tests assuming that Dipper would cap at level 86 (giving a 10 level spread like Nazuna):

I won't claim that my trend is perfect, but I'd be willing to bet that whoever got the level 80 cap info actually spawned a level 79 DipperYuly (3042 HP) and that the actual level 80 max HP is closer to 3100 (seems to gain ~50 HP per level).

Edited, Mar 4th 2011 3:27am by Bookmarku

Edited, Mar 4th 2011 3:34am by Bookmarku

Audacious Anna Testing

As you'd expect, AudaciousAnna is uncapped to 90. Here are the raw numbers and the Max HP for each pet:

The level 85 info on the wiki listed AA's max HP as 4530, so if the collected data shows her HP increases by about 70 per level, then the max HP by level approximately looks like this:

Level Maximum HP
85 4530
86 (4599)
87 (4671)
88 4744
89 4814
90 4886

Edited, Mar 4th 2011 5:41am by Bookmarku

Flowerpot Merle Testing

Just finished up the FlowerpotMerle testing, which took the longest so far to show a 3-level spawn gap. I was really close to falsely concluding a level 89 cap pet, but a level 90 jug finally showed up on the 18th try. :) So FlowerpotMerle is still uncapped. I'll post the important data bits, but I have them all copied down and screenshotted if needed.

I think that the level 80 Max HP should be closer to 3900, since pet HP seems to otherwise reliably increase by similar amounts every level. In this instance, FlowerpotMerle gains approximately 64 HP/level. I hope this helps!

Edited, Mar 4th 2011 6:07am by Bookmarku

Lucky Lulush Testing

Contrary to my experience with the mandragora jug, LL was a quick test, which confirmed that it is still an uncapped jug pet (that was a pleasant surprise!).

Based on the HP amounts for 88-90, I'd guess that LuckyLulush's HP @79 is 3648 and @80 is actually ~3700. After the hassle with getting some of these pets to pop at max level, it doesn't shock me at all to see these discrepancies show up in older "one-shot" tests (I appreciate that those approximate values were discovered though, made for a good benchmark! <3)

Edited, Mar 4th 2011 6:42am by Bookmarku

Edit about LuckyLulush:

I remember back when LL came out, it could spawn higher than cap (at that time 80) if you had Beast Affinity merits, so I repeated this test with 2 levels of BA and still ended up with the same max HP spread - oh well.

Thank you for the hp tests. Wow, you spent alot of Dipper Yuly to test this. Fantastic information though. I'll take some time this weekend to update more of the wiki pages. HP/pet is very useful information to have there. tp/hit also imo.

Those are all the jug pets that I have access to at the moment - I can never seem to get my hands on PrestoJulio, DiscreetLouise, or BugeyedBroncha. It was really great to see so many uncapped jugs out of all the testing. Also, it gave me a lot of confidence in BST-related mechanics that I had never explored before (like pets spawning 0-2 levels below cap - I just accepted that as truth when I first read Call Beast's info).

I don't know what SE's fascination is with that HP modifier... That makes for 5 pets that share the same max HP trend. Do these pets have any other stats in common with one another?

And that just leaves Discreet Louise...

having a common hp pattern for multiple pets does not really surprise me. I was reviewing you HP findings and making some comparisons.

I would remove Yuly and Merle from the comparisons because they are not Warriors. All the remaining pets are warriors I believe. I have not confirmed Louise's job, but probably a warrior. The crit attack bonus is present for all so far (haven't tested merle or clyvonne). Also Fencer is present for all but yuly.

Actually, Upon reviewing it mayb be taht Julio and Sieghard only have fencer 1, while the other's have fencer 2, and I have no explanation for the 35~40% crit rate on Louise. BTW, I tested nazuna has 6.5 tp/hit. the delay should be as Iceman calculated (single hand weapons, standard calculations, no store tp).

Actually, I wonder how to compare Fargann then... his hp is so much lower, but he's clearly warrior. I guess the differences are in 'race' so to speak, or moreso family. Fargann hp is more like a tarutaru, nazuna more like a galka. Clyvonne and Anna like Elvaan.. lulush etc like hume/mithra.... actually checking numbers w/ the D rank above as the standard....

Nazuna has 25% more hp clyvone and anna have 12.5% more hp shasra only has 6.25% more hp and fargann has 12.5% less hp

not a bad comparison... therefore it would really put the 'D' Rank more as the C. Shasra would be mroe like a B rank for hp and Fargan Still an E. and clyonne and Anna are B+/A-

Actually, I wonder how to compare Fargann then... his hp is so much lower, but he's clearly warrior. I guess the differences are in 'race' so to speak, or moreso family. Fargann hp is more like a tarutaru, nazuna more like a galka. Clyvonne and Anna like Elvaan.. lulush etc like hume/mithra.... actually checking numbers w/ the D rank above as the standard....

Nazuna has 25% more hp clyvone and anna have 12.5% more hp shasra only has 6.25% more hp and fargann has 12.5% less hp

not a bad comparison... therefore it would really put the 'D' Rank more as the C. Shasra would be mroe like a B rank for hp and Fargan Still an E. and clyonne and Anna are B+/A-

Very interesting comparison! :D It doesn't seem quite so arbitrary when it's nicely pieced together like that~

Using the information Kegsay figured out, and my own data, it was pretty easy to confirm that pdif caps at 4.2 for bst pets just like h found w/ avatars. The min/max range is 4.0/4.2. I'm wouldn't be suprised if automatons come out the same, but they actually have skills that would affect this.. so I'm not sure.

by running the pdif values back into the min/max Melee hits I found some other interesting information. (didn't use crits because of 8% crit bonus applied at the end, going over the pdif cap)

It looks like the (assumed STR-modified) base damage is very close for all the WAR type pets. Its so close in fact, I'll bet the difference is primarily from level. I'll take a war type and re-run this test a few times to see if I can get the damage from fatso or something to match shasra.

I suspect the differences we'll see at higher levels comes from the inherent attack of each pet. It looks like the damage potential is quite balanced. I still expect to see differences in base attack though.

yuly won't fit this pattern being a thf, Louise.... just seems a strange exception. I don't expect Merle to match the above either. I really want to test Louise and Merle more. I think I'll be shouting in jeuno for a crafter before long...

I can confirm the level 89 max HP at a later date, but it should be close to ~4013.

Edit: It's probably nothing, but it felt like there was a certain likelihood for varying pet levels to spawn. I don't know if data like this was ever collected before, but I tallied 80 Call Beast samples where there was an array of levels (so it excludes capped Nazunas, or singular level pets like BloodclawShasra) and it looked like this:

I'd love to see results for this testing with Monster Gloves and/or Monster Gloves +1 equipped. I'd presume we'd see a higher percentage of level 90 pets spawned in this case as that's the whole point of the relic hands, but it'd be nice to finally know for sure if the HQ actually makes a difference in relation to the NQ when it comes to the level a jug spawns at. Oh, and it's actually nice to know my Beast Affinity Merits are still useful till level 96. If all (except for Nazuna) or most of the jugs are eventually proven to be uncapped we might as well drop BA in favor of some other category 2 BST merit, since not even BA5 will make Nazuna go past level 96. We will need to wait for the level cap to be raised.

When the level cap goes up to 95, the only reason I could see for dropping BA merits would be if we found a jug pet that met the following criteria: 1. Caps at lvl 95 or higher 2. Is as effective as NN 3. Is as cheap as NN

When the cap goes up to 99, Anna is probably cheap enough that she could be the new NN, and let me drop my BA merits.

However, if it turns out that certain situational jugs cap at 91 (say, Dipper or Fatso), it may be worth holding onto those BA merits even at 99.

____________________________

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FFXI veteran (Lyonheart and Lakiskline of Lakshmi) 1/467 on signed HQ Weskit!!!

As for the BA discussion, I agree for the most part with what is being said. :D During this 90-cap phase, I'll still keep 2 BA merits solely for Nazuna, and after the 95 cap is released, might go 5/5 again depending on what pets they release in the future. <3 the Sheep. I'm rockin' 3/5 Feral Howl and 5/5 Killer Instinct in the meantime.

I'd love to see results for this testing with Monster Gloves and/or Monster Gloves +1 equipped. I'd presume we'd see a higher percentage of level 90 pets spawned in this case as that's the whole point of the relic hands, but it'd be nice to finally know for sure if the HQ actually makes a difference in relation to the NQ when it comes to the level a jug spawns at. Oh, and it's actually nice to know my Beast Affinity Merits are still useful till level 96. If all (except for Nazuna) or most of the jugs are eventually proven to be uncapped we might as well drop BA in favor of some other category 2 BST merit, since not even BA5 will make Nazuna go past level 96. We will need to wait for the level cap to be raised.

Great, help us out and provide the information for AF2 jug summons. :) You probably only have to do one pet with which ever set of gloves you have--then we just have to wait for someone to do the same testing with the +1/NQ and we're set. ^^

When the level cap goes up to 95, the only reason I could see for dropping BA merits would be if we found a jug pet that met the following criteria: 1. Caps at lvl 95 or higher 2. Is as effective as NN 3. Is as cheap as NN

When the cap goes up to 99, Anna is probably cheap enough that she could be the new NN, and let me drop my BA merits.

However, if it turns out that certain situational jugs cap at 91 (say, Dipper or Fatso), it may be worth holding onto those BA merits even at 99.

there are already pets more effective than nazuna with higher level cap and stronger attacks.

cheap... well only merle is cheaper I think. situational. others are not far.

there are already pets more effective than nazuna with higher level cap and stronger attacks.

cheap... well only merle is cheaper I think. situational. others are not far.

Unless it's better and cheaper at the same time, Nazuna is going to stay my staple.

But face it, at 99 cap, Nazuna will simply be too weak. It will usually spawn at levels 94-96.

you should double check Bookmarku's testing above. when pet is capped, it will spawn at cap every time. Its trying to spawn between 0~2 levels below you. that will pull it to cap when you are at least 2 levels higher than the cap.

Over 3 times nazuna on gilgamesh and way less hp to boot. Anna has almost the same hp and is only twice the cost. Hope that stays true on carbuncle. Fireball/Aoelian edge aoe killing could be nice.

____________________________

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Maybe if we wait long enough, he'll tell us about how he walked barefoot uphill through snow both ways in Uleregand and defeated the evil Snoll Tzar with nothing but a stack of pebbles. Men were men back then. Mithra were men, too, but they don't talk about that.

Mellowy is awesome, now.

Quote:

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Courier Carrie: She has a lot going against her. 75 Cap, Weak melee stats and she doesn't benefit from the performance boost seen in lv 76+ pet. However she has 1 unique benefit that may be of some use.

Bubble Curtain = MDT-50%

Stacks with Atmas. I Assume it stack with Gear and Traits as well.

DG + Curtain Caused CC to take 0 damage from magical attacks until the Curtain's effect wears off or is dispelled. I tried it out and she was taking 0 damage from Stonega III, Drain and Stone V. I'll stress again that CC caps at 75, and has very weak melee stats. Accuracy and Attack are horrendous, I am uncertain if Atmas and full merits will counter this to any notable degree.

I believe Bubble Curtain is 50% Magic Defense Bonus, which is not as potent as straight minus Magic Damage Taken.

Like I said. When I used Bubble Curtain combined with Ducal Guard all magic damage (Spells and Attacks) were dealing 0 damage to CC, this is while fighting monsters that con DC to level 90. I know "Shell" is what appears in the log, and "Magic Defense" is what is stated in the description, but It just does not add up. CC wasn't just resisting the spells, she was flat out taking 0 damage from every form of magical attack... so it leads me to believe that it Magic Damage Taken and not Magic Defense Bonus... perhaps someone with more experience can shed some light on it.

I was fighting Amoebans while testing it out. Stonega III, Stone V, Nucleic Implosion, Vacuole Discharge, and Osmosis were all doing 0 damage while Ducals and Bubble Curtain was up. Osmosis would dispel the "Shell" effect however.

Bubble Curtain by default gives a -50% Shell (MDT) effect. I'm assuming this is what Carrie has. Don't take ability descriptions 100% seriously; even the description for the Shell spells say they "enhance magic defense", and if you're interpreting that to mean "Magic Defense Bonus" specifically, you would be incorrect. ****, don't always take the chat log 100% seriously either; Boost clearly says it "enhances attacks" even though it only enhances the next ONE attack. :|

There are a few crabs out there that use an altered version of the move and gain (undispellable) MDB from it instead, as indicated in the chat log. Nightmare Crabs in Dynamis are one, as is the T1 VNM Sunderclaw.

I believe Bubble Curtain is 50% Magic Defense Bonus, which is not as potent as straight minus Magic Damage Taken.

Like I said. When I used Bubble Curtain combined with Ducal Guard all magic damage (Spells and Attacks) were dealing 0 damage to CC, this is while fighting monsters that con DC to level 90. I know "Shell" is what appears in the log, and "Magic Defense" is what is stated in the description, but It just does not add up. CC wasn't just resisting the spells, she was flat out taking 0 damage from every form of magical attack... so it leads me to believe that it Magic Damage Taken and not Magic Defense Bonus... perhaps someone with more experience can shed some light on it.

I was fighting Amoebans while testing it out. Stonega III, Stone V, Nucleic Implosion, Vacuole Discharge, and Osmosis were all doing 0 damage while Ducals and Bubble Curtain was up. Osmosis would dispel the "Shell" effect however.

Edited, Mar 30th 2011 3:56pm by GagBag

This is actually a pretty interesting way to get 100% -dt w/out dealing w/ Winged Gloom Slip damage or the loss of Razed Ruin. You will want max Beast affinity Merits, which will bring carrie up to level 85. Remember Carrie is a PLD however. Carrie will NOT get Critical Attack bonus or Fencer. Carrie will not likely have much hp. I've not done any HP tests w/ carrie, but I still have a stack, so Its pretty cheap to go test in abyssea a little later. Also of note: Carrie does blunt damage unlike most 76+ pets which are slashing damage.

You will still be sacrificing ALOT of damage output, but it might be a reliable/cheap way to have a near perfect tank.

How long does Bubble Curtain last? It requires 3 charges so use and the lvl 75 CC would probably take that long to get 100% TP anyway lol. But very interesting observation.

Since Bubble Curtain's potency is always the same, I've thought that it might be possible that its duration varies with TP. But that's just a theory; I have absolutely nothing to back that up. I don't see the effect lasting longer than a minute or so, in any case.

How long does Bubble Curtain last? It requires 3 charges so use and the lvl 75 CC would probably take that long to get 100% TP anyway lol. But very interesting observation.

Since Bubble Curtain's potency is always the same, I've thought that it might be possible that its duration varies with TP. But that's just a theory; I have absolutely nothing to back that up. I don't see the effect lasting longer than a minute or so, in any case.

Timed Bubble Curtains well over 3 mins. Was able to recover 3 charges and CC was still taking 0 damage from magical attacks. I would says its 4~5 mins duration.